Sunday, May 3, 2009

#5 Locating Useful Feeds

I tried searching for interesting blogs using both Bloglines and Technorati. Using the "search for posts" option in Bloglines with the search term "calligrapher" turned up no results. Changing the search option to "search for posts" turned up a few results, but nothing that interested me. I changed the search term to "calligraphy" and tried both options again. This time "search for feeds" turned up posts on a Japanese calligraphy blog and on BibliOdyssey, a blog on books, illustrations, book history, and other aspects of the book arts. Finally I tried the "search the Web" option, and that turned up the most interesting and relevant results, although not all of them are blogs and may or may not have an RSS feed. Interesting to note that Bloglines has partnered with Ask.com for its "search the Web" option. Google has so pervaded the Web that it's easy to forget that there are still several other very useful search engines.

I repeated the exercise using Technorati, searching both posts and blogs for "calligraphy" and "calligrapher," and got an entirely different set of results. I found public domain (mostly) illustrations From Old Books, and Arabic Calligraphy. The posts are mostly in Arabic or romanized Arabic, but the illustrations are still very enjoyable. Technorati also turned up the blog on the website of a calligraphy supplier in the UK.

I first had the impression that Bloglines was only searching the feeds and posts of blogs that other Bloglines subscribers had already subscribed to, but then I saw that some of the blogs it found for my search had zero subscribers. So I can't quite account for the differences, but my overall impression is that Technorati did a better job of finding "what I really wanted," as opposed to "what I asked for."

I forgot which one found Chainsaw Calligraphy, which is most decidedly not about calligraphy as I know it. One of them found the website of the Society of Scribes, the real pros, but it doesn't have an RSS feed. One of these days maybe I'll have time to take a class with them.

7 comments:

The difference between "wanted" and "asked for" is a subtle, but important distinction. One that reference librarians are faced with daily!

An easy work around whether or not a site has an RSS feed is using Firefox- there is a little RSS icon that will allow you to subscribe to a page automatically! It's pretty automated and you can add it to your bloglines account.

That's actually been my preferred method for some time now. I use Google to find interesting websites, and then just look for the RSS feed icon in the address bar. Then I add the feed to Google Reader. Google totally pwns me. {sigh}

Are you a calligrapher? I made money in high school lettering things for people. It takes more time and imagination than I have now. Have you been to http://www.calligraphicarts.org? Quite inspiring. Flickr some of your work, if you have any to show.

Hi Susan, I used to be. I haven't done any for years, but there was one year when I was actively soliciting work and even had a Yellow Pages listing. I made almost $2000 doing calligraphy that year. Woo-hoo! Now that school is finished, I plan to take it up again, and also do some drawing and painting. And reading for fun.

I like your letters. Computers have made the design of the pieces so important now that people take beautiful letter forms for granted.A propos Rye: As it happens, it was my sister's husband, Larry Philbrick, whose first cousin lived in Rye, NH. Her name is Mary Brown and she was the Director of the Rye Free Reading Room (Library?) in the late 70's and early 80's. She moved on to Plattsburg, NY, and has since retired to the Adirondacks. Someone might remember her, though. Best of luck to you.